The summer blockbuster season is officially upon us, kicking off this weekend with a lineup of typical popcorn-fueled crowd-pleasers: The Hangover Part II, Kung Fu Panda 2, and…  The Tree of Life.

Terrence Malick‘s The Tree of Life, the Palme d’Or winner at this year’s Cannes Film Festival, doesn’t sound like the usual summer movie fodder — and it doesn’t look like it, either, even though it’s got dinosaurs. But the timing of its release is central to Tree‘s marketing strategy, part of distributor Fox Searchlight‘s effort to position it as “a different kind of summer event.”

Read more

New York-based boutique PR agency Morris + King has acquired Workhouse Publicity, a boutique specializing in fashion, publishing, luxury, consumer and lifestyle accounts.

As part of the deal, Workhouse Publicity Founder and CEO Adam Nelson is named president of The Morris + King Company.

Workhouse has twelve staffers, and has worked with clients including Francis Ford Coppola, David LaChapelle, International Emmy Awards, Virgin, TiVo, Saks Fifth Avenue and Versace.

“We’re really trying to expand our fashion and luxury, consumer and lifestyle accounts,” Morris + King co-founder and partner/principal Judith King told PRNewser today. “The connection with him [Nelson] was instantaneous.”

“[Agency co-founder and partner/principal Andy Morris] and I collectively felt it would be great to have someone amp up the volume for us,” said King, but added that the move is a “major leap of faith” because up until now, the agency’s growth has been organic, mostly via the work of its two founders.

Terms of the deal were not disclosed, although King did say the deal was “not millions of dollars, but we spent a fair amount.”